


Letter From the Deathbed of Hajime

by an3m1c



Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Adopted Children, Angst, Angst and Feels, Angst and Humor, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Angst and Romance, Angst and Tragedy, Character Death, Character Study, Comfort/Angst, Family Fluff, Fluff, Fluff and Angst, Fluff and Humor, Heavy Angst, M/M, Minor Character Death, One Shot, Original Character(s), POV First Person, Romantic Fluff, lucia(she/they) is iwaoi's adopted child, old man hajime has one hell of a funny bone i hate him, together they have tiny kiddos aka iwaoi's grandchildren
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-20
Updated: 2021-02-20
Packaged: 2021-03-16 11:07:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,252
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29575083
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/an3m1c/pseuds/an3m1c
Summary: I know that our grandchildren will grow out of this grief gracefully, in a way only children are able to, and I know our Lucia and her partner will know how to hold each other through their mourning.But you, Tooru. You are something else.*****Hajime's final parting words
Relationships: Iwaizumi Hajime & Oikawa Tooru, Iwaizumi Hajime/Oikawa Tooru
Comments: 13
Kudos: 72





	Letter From the Deathbed of Hajime

To my love Tooru,

My body doesn’t work the way they used to, but I will write your name as many times as I can before my hands give out on me. You make fun of me now for my valiant efforts at writing an old fashioned letter, but I know you will thank me later. 

This letter is for you Tooru. 

Tooru - the love of my life. 

Tooru - my childhood best friend. 

Tooru - the best person I could’ve come across on this godforsaken planet.

Tooru - the man who will outlive me.

Of course you would outlive me. Even as we grew old and laced with wrinkles, your stubbornness always shone through. And as I watch you frolic through our home with our grandchildren I wonder if you’ll defeat death too. 

I know it’s absurd—living forever, that is—yet it feels as though you might be the first to do so. I do wish I could witness it by your side. I can imagine the headlines already: Oikawa Tooru, Genetic Anomaly Turned Immortal Clown. Our grandkids would love it.

Old age and death go hand and hand. When others look at me and my withering condition, death is not a difficult image to conjure. You of all people know I’ve long accepted death, but in spite of that so much of it doesn’t feel real. 

Now, I spend most of my days bedridden, watching my family and the love of my life dance around my inmobile body. It’s really not as tragic as I make it out to be. I’m actually quite grateful. Not only am I surrounded by life, but I feel full of it too. Perhaps that’s death giving me one last chance to savor this mortal world. Between the kisses that you still place so gently on my forehead and our child Lucia’s cooking, it’s impossible to imagine death. Yet I do so anyways because I’m, as you so elegantly put it all these years, “a fool. Iwa-chan’s such a fool.” 

Some nights I would practice dying. I imagined myself slipping into darkness and staying there, still and lifeless. There’s no reason to do this; I never will it to happen. But as a long-retired volleyball player and trainer, we’ve always been creatures of habit. I believe our younger years chained us buffoons to the comfort of repetition. Dying isn’t something we do regularly like sharing breakfast with the family, reaching over to hold your hand in the mornings, or singing lullabies to our grandchildren.

Generally speaking, dying doesn’t feel like a terribly unpleasant experience. The idea of slipping into sleep while surrounded by the family we’ve created for each other sounds quite peaceful. Perhaps more so for me than the rest of you. I imagine our Lucia wouldn’t want her children nearby when it happens (is three and four too young for a first-death experience?). Even though these next few weeks are supposed to be about me, I don’t think I’ll get a say in this matter. It’s been a while since we’ve wrangled toddlers, so I’m sure Lucia will know what to do with little Natsu and Kanae. She’s our child, after all.

I know that our grandchildren will grow out of this grief gracefully, in a way only children are able to, and I know our Lucia and her partner will know how to hold each other through their mourning.

But you, Tooru. You are something else.

Now, if I sound annoyed by your longevity, it’s because I am. You, Oikawa Tooru, have never lived a day without me. Not a day has gone by in which you did not walk this earth and I wasn’t treading the same soil.

I’m annoyed because ~~I’m afraid~~ I’m worried.

I know you are strong—you’re the strongest person I know. We’ve carried each other through our parents’ deaths and our grandparents’ deaths and our friends’ deaths. But this is unexplored territory, Tooru.

I’m not saying that you dying first would be the preferable alternative (I would never wish that on my dear Tooru). But at the end of the day, I don’t know what’s worse: you having to bear the weight of my death or you watching as you leave me behind. My life brings you pain, and my death brings you pain. ~~This world truly is atrocious isn’t it, Tooru?~~ I’m sorry.

I tell myself that I would be able to handle your death. I lived for a whole month before you came along, which is a month more experience than you have for this situation. I do believe that’s a win—albeit a twisted one—for me, no?

How is it that I am still thinking about death as I am surrounded by my lover, my legacy, and the ocean? Perhaps you were right Tooru, I am a brute. A brute with nothing on his mind but life, death, food, sex. The latter a little less so these days, but for future reference, I still think you could get it after I pass. Maybe don’t tell this to the kids. I believe this is what they’d call “cringe”.

There’s so much I want to thank you for while I can still write it. Hopefully you've learned to take a compliment by now, or else the rest of this letter will be unbearable. Even if you can’t, I’m sure you’ll read it anyways because, somehow, you’ll see this as a challenge. And seriously? Challenging a dead man? Have some respect, Tooru (you know I love you right?).

Here goes.

Thank you Tooru for bringing me to the ocean. Imagine how our teenage selves would have reacted if we told them we’d retire to a beach house? I still can’t believe it sometimes. It reminds me of Miyagi. I know the sand and the landscapes don’t look quite the same, don’t feel the same, yet as my eyes follow the motion of the waves, I find it effortless to imagine myself in both Miyagi and Argentina. Imagine that Tooru, me dying in Argentina. How romantic and picturesque.

Thank you Tooru for convincing me to have children. God, I know you’re thinking something along the lines of “you were always meant to be a father” or something equally sappy, but I never told you how terrified I was talking to Lucia for the first time before adopting them. Children were never fond of me. Even your nephew took years to warm up to me. But now, I can’t imagine a life without them. They’re radiant Tooru. They’re brave and kind and all the best things about us and more. I’m honored to have gotten to know her in this lifetime. We didn’t do too bad did we Tooru?

Thank you Tooru for introducing me to volleyball. It’s incredible how something so small held us together for so long. Neither of us have played in ages, yet my memories of playing and coaching stand strong against the will of time. I can still feel the ghost of a good spike on my palms (though at this age I doubt my body would be able to handle that). Maybe I should give it a try anyways. What do I have to lose? And can you imagine the tourists’ faces if they saw an old man like me trying to spike on the sand? I wouldn’t mind taking that image with me ~~to the grave~~ into our next lives.

Thank you Tooru for talking to me on the playground when we were three years old. You never believed me whenever I said I remember this moment  vividly , but it’s your loss. Real or not, I’ve held onto this for decades, played it through my mind like a movie because it still doesn’t feel real. What are the chances that I would meet the love of my life by ramming my feet into his face as I slid down a tube slide? Talk about love taking you by surprise, am I right?

******************************

Tooru, I apologize for not writing this last part by hand. I am transcribing this by voice and Lucia offered to check over it for me later. Speaking isn’t particularly easy now either, but I need you to have this before I go.

(One last “thank you”, Tooru. You can get through this.)

Thank you Tooru for giving me everything. You gave me your heart and a home. You gave me purpose and love. You gave me yourself, Tooru.

So in death, I will give you my entire existence. 

My love, everything is made of stardust. As someone who loved the sky before he loved himself, you know this to be true. It’s because of this that I have accepted my death. I hope it helps you accept it too. 

Tooru, we are a never ending cycle of death and creation. Every year just from within our home, I see the leaves on distant trees wither and be reborn with the hatching of sea turtles. I’ve watched this dance from a distance all my life, and now I bring the tune into our home. 

I do hope you someday find comfort in it, Tooru. I’ve come to quite like it. Sometimes, I even see myself in it. My love, this melody is everlasting because nothing truly ends when particles hold memories of who they once were.

When humans mapped out the world with one out of reach, perhaps we were really reaching out to lost loved souls for direction. Looking out the window, I’d like to think the twinkling stars are Makki and Mattsun giggling at some absurd joke and who’s to tell me that isn’t the truth?

In this lifetime we are placed in mortal bodies. Others find themselves in the petals of a flower or floating in the sky as celestial giants. Yet they look at us humans - frail, flawed, and unknowing - and see themselves.

Perhaps, the stars are closer to us than we think. Perhaps, they're a lover from a past life, a grandfather, old friends laughing in the sky. Whoever they are, one day we'll join them as stardust, wandering throughout space free of human intentions. Free to exist with each other again.

Every love was written in the stars because gravity pulled bodies together before the human heart knew how to beat. There’s nothing else that can explain us, Tooru. Because how else do you explain our chance encounter as children as anything other than fate etched into time and space? I believe that’s why people - all messy in their drawn borders and tangled thoughts - are still capable of loving more than their bodies can give. That’s why, even as I lay on my deathbed (a comfortable one at that), I give my love to my grandchildren, my Lucia, my Tooru. 

I give because I am infinite. I am infinite in my love and my desires to give and give again until I reassemble myself in a different form only to give myself away again. This body is a temporary home that will be given away to the birds, the fungi, and the bugs. And even in death I will give. 

No. 

_Because_ of death, I will give.

I will continue to give because I am stardust - infinite in whatever form I take. Because giving is loving is taking and giving again. Because no matter what form I take next, everyone I love will exist with me as stardust.

Tooru, we will be together again someday. We'll look a little different. Perhaps I will be a tree or a river or a bird. And you, something too beautiful to be tethered by any human language.

Until we meet again, know that I never left you, never will, never could leave you. Think of me when you look at the sky and the turtles. Think of me when you look at Lucia and her children. Think of me when you look at yourself.

I will be wherever you need me to be. I'm infinite in all I can be and all I can give. And in every life, I'll give my everything to you Tooru. 

Before then, give my love to our family, give my love to our home, give my love to yourself.

Tooru, I love y-

******************************

Hi Papá, 

I didn’t have the heart to alter any of dad’s final words, but I have no doubt in my mind that his last few were “I love you”. He’s arguably more stubborn than you. No, you don’t get to fight me on this. There’s no way he would’ve let death take him before completing that sentence. That’s your Hajime for you. 

I love you lots, Papá. And give yourself some of dad’s love too, okay? There’s more than enough to go around.

The kids and I will be over next weekend. Little Kanae and Natsu want to show their grandpas how much better they’ve gotten at passing (almost as much as they want to see the baby turtles). I hope they’re not too much trouble.

Love,

Lucia

P.S. When you get the chance, could you help us pick a name for our third child? We can’t seem to settle on one.

******************************

Hi Lucia,

Tell the little ones grandpa sends muchos abrazos y besos, and he can't wait to see their new skills.

Remember to bring thin jackets to watch the turtles. It's a bit windy in the evenings.

Love,

Papá

P.S. I think their name should be Hajime. I can’t wait to meet them.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading! Here, I have some tissues ready for you <3
> 
> You're welcome to drop by and scream with me (or at me) on [Twitter](https://twitter.com/an3m1c) anytime :)


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